Like my previous report, I'm running the swashbuckler alongside a party of pregen PCs through a PFS scenario. I choose the Penumbral Accords because it's a combat heavy scenario, and because it appears to be a popular scenario that many of us are familiar with.
Party includes Swashbuckler Sid, Kyra the Cleric, Ezren the Wizard, and Amiri the Barbarian.
On my last report, I ran with the rogue instead of the barbarian. I switched that out here, as there is little need here for a dedicated rogue character and because I wanted a standard-issue frontliner to compare with the swashbuckler. I considered whether to use the pregen barbarian or fighter, but seeing as the fighter has been (at best) a non-entity whenever I've seen him used, I chose the barbarian.
Abilities Str 8, Dex 18, Con 14, Int 13, Wis 8, Cha 16
[spoiler=Panache Notes:]With one panache: Add 4 damage, add +2 initiative, use swift action to demoralize after each hit.
Note: This puts him a bit over standard WBL for a level 4 character. I'm assuming that this PFS character has played up a bit.
I've also given the pregen Kyra an extra wand of Cure Light Wounds, as every PFS party I've ever played had a couple people who invested prestige into wands to manage out of combat healing.
Build Thoughts:
I designed this build to try and simply match up with the way it appears this class is meant to be played. Strictly speaking, there are more optimized builds (personally I want to play with a monk multiclass that takes advantage of Snake style unarmed attacks).
That being said, off the boards most of the people I play with use less esoteric builds, if not outright poor builds (a gunslinger at my table actually has two skill focus feats (sense motive and appraise), to give you an idea of what appears to be normal). There has been a great deal of feedback indicating that there is not (or is) sufficient support to justify actually leaving Dex and Cha high - Using standard high str and power attack builds may actually be more optimized.
I am not trying to decide whether or not those STR/power attack builds are better than what the class appears to ask for out of the box. Rather, I've attempted to build an out of the box swashbuckler and simply run it through a PFS scenario. Hopefully, he'll outperform the pregens (using the level 4 wizard, cleric, and barbarian pregens), hopefully he'll also feel relevant to the scenario.
Encounter 1: Play by Play:
Sid won initiative, and charged the skeleton. He missed on a 12 (total 23).
The skeleton full attacked back in his face, hitting with four out of five attacks (only one wing missed), and critting with a claw attack; total 30 damage to Sid.
Wizard hit the skelly with a magic missile for 6 damage.
Barbarian raged & charged, also missing, this time missing with a four.
Kyra cast Cure Moderate wounds and applied it to the skeleton, doing 15 damage.
Sid then Attempted Dirty trick to blind the skeleton. Stuck rocks or something in the eye sockets. I don't know, but it works. He rolled a 15 and managed it for one round. Sid then 5' stepped back.
Skeleton failed its perception check to find where Sid ended up, and so opted to full attack the cleric instead. Arguably the mindless undead should have milled around aimlessly chasing the Swashbuckler... but the GM said no. And so it full attacked at Kyra instead. This time it only landed three hits (thanks to miss chances), for a total 14 damage.
Wizard missed with the crossbow.
Amiri landed a hit for 17 damage, reduced to 12 after DR.
Kyra stepped back and channeled energy to do more damage - did 10 damage.
Sid missed again, this time rolling a 14.
Skeleton full attacked Kyra again, knocking her out.
Wizard plinked away, missed.
Kyra stabilized on her first try.
Amiri swung again, doing 16 damage and dropping the skeleton.
We wrapped up by feeding the cleric a couple of the wizards CLW potions, Kyra then used a wand of CLW to top us all off.
Encounter 1 Analysis:
This is a tough one. With an AC of 25, Sid needed a 16 to hit (incidentally, Amiri needed the same while raging). That being said, even on a hit, Sid was only doing 1d6+4 damage, or 1d6-1 after DR was accounted for. Arguably, he should have been using a morningstar to bypass DR, but to be frank, I'm not sure if he still gets his precision damage while doing bludgeoning damage. I've never been entirely clear on how that works - usually it doesn't matter, but some anti-munchkin types (just as annoying as the munchkins) could argue that you only do one or the other, and that you don't get the benefits of piercing damage while doing bludgeoning damage. But maybe I'm just being dumb; but hey, that fits with many players at my home table.
Kyra needed the same to hit, but did 2d8+5 effective damage after DR. She wasn't switching weapons because she obviously has an unhealthy attachment to that greatsword.
And, of course, Kyra the cleric was the star. Makes sense, this was a rough encounter for unprepared PCs, so that positive energy helped greatly.
As to the swashbuckler features in particular: not much to say. Demoralizing wasn't terribly helpful, and he didn't have much else here to do other than attack and do damage. I also wasted two points of panache trying to double damage but missing.
Encounter 2 Play by Play:
Sid won initiative again, charging in. He threatened a crit but failed to confirm; did 7 damage (2).
Amiri went next, also charging (no rage this time), and doing 14 damage(9).
Kyra Moved (couldn't charge with current geometry), and actually confirmed a crit, doing 16 damage (11).
Wizard remembered his wand of Magic missile and did 2 damage.
Golem did a breath attack, hitting everyone but Kyra. Wizard took 10 damage, Sid and Amiri both made their saves and took 5.
Sid attacked, critting (rolling 18 and 12) and doing 11 damage (6).
Amiri hit for another 11 points of damage (6).
Wizard threw down a scorching ray (that he probably should have used earlier), doing 19 damage (adjusted for fire vulnerability).
Kyra missed.
Golem died, blew up and did 16 damage to Amiri and Kyra, and 8 damage to Sid.
Kyra CLWed everyone back up to full.
Encounter 2 Analysis:
Much easier encounter, Sid still is lagging behind in damage, without strong options or alternates. Even if he had had the panache to double his precision damage on each attack, he still would have done less damage than Amiri.
Dirty trick probably would have been useful, but that was a feat-based option, not class based.
He didn't have enough panache banked to be able to rely on parry (nor a need for it if he had it), couldn't demoralize a golem, and wasn't much else to do.
You only had 5 pieces of gear? Nothing but the rapier, your armor, your buckler, and your clothes (presumably Traveler's, as that's the only one that makes sense for your character and doesn't put you over your light Load. Barely.)?
The alchemist wins initiative, hitting all four of us with a bomb. Somehow, by sheer luck, the lowest rolled save was an 18., so we all took 8 damage off the bat.
Amiri went next, charging, hitting (no rage still), and doing 11 damage.
Sid moved in, hit with an 11, did 10 damage (doubled precision damage, back down to 1 panache). Failed to demoralize - rolled a 1.
Wizard plinked away with magic missile, 4 damage.
Kyra channeled to heal us all up, managed to bring everyone back to full.
Alchemist full attacks with claws and such on Sid; two out of three hits, doing 13 total damage.
Amiri again, just 10 damage.
Sid crits, doing 11 more damage and recovering a panache. He also succeeds in his demoralization with a five. :)
Wizard did 5 damage with magic missile.
Kyra hit with her scimitar, doing 5 damage.
Fetchling uses a withdrawal option to get out of melee and up a wall.
Amiri dropped her sword and drew then fired her longbow, doing 8 damage.
Sid did the same, but only did 3 damage.
Wizard's magic missile knocked out the alchemist.
And Kyra topped off our HP.
Analysis:
At first glance, Sid is finally keeping up with Amiri at damage - melee totals were actually the same. Of course, Sid doubled his precision damage and critted during the match, and Amiri never rolled higher than a 2 on her d8 damage die...
Remaining encounters:
I'm short on RL time and I'm loosing motivation to post my play-by-plays, so here is a brief summary of the remaining encounters.
Sid managed to consistently outdamage the cleric and wizard, but never managed to really keep up with Amiri, even when she wasn't raging, power attacking, or cleaving.
The low point of the match was failing his save against the Shadow Hound's bay. Bravery didn't help.
Not much else of note occured that hasn't been reported
Final Analysis:
Sid's low will is really killing him here. Frankly, I'm not sure if Sid is ultimately survivable while dumping WIS. Fort isn't quite as bad, as he's got points in CON - it's more helpful thanks to hit points in addition to the save. While bravery technically helped with that hound's bay, the +1 really didn't actually help.
Oddly enough, I've found that the precision mechanic actually takes away from the fun of the class. At level one, the parrys and ripostes were entertaining (not necessarily effective, but fun). But now that precise strike has come online, the strong motivation for panache use is to increase his precision damage; that effectively takes away from the more active deeds. Part of me almost wants to say that taking away the option to spend panache to increase damage would make the class more fun; but it's having enough trouble with damage that I'm not sure I want to excacerbate that.
That being said, Menacing Swordplay was the standout Swashbuckler ability. He doesn't have much else to do with his swift actions, and his charisma and skill points equate to a solid intimidate skill. Assuming his enemy wasn't mindless, Demoralization was helpful.
Consistently, the most effective thing he should have been doing was throwing down blinds with dirty trick; but that doesn't seem particularly true to the playtest as any full BAB class could have done the same with his feat choices - it isn't a class-specific option.
Also, in response to Cheapy's question, if this was one of my actual campaign or PFS characters, he'd almost certainly have a bunch of masterwork tools and a pack-mule worth of other random mundane gear.
I probably would also have a better selection of other weapons - I didn't mention the vanilla longbow carried along.
Generally, I'm a big fan of cold iron and silver spiked gauntlets, as well as making sure I've got a bludgeoning weapon up my sleeve.
But, again, I tried to play with the general preparation level of the other players at my table. (It's worth noting that I've become something of a power-gamer out of self defense).
